According to John Berardi - Do Your Cardio! for cutting AND bulking. He said to do moderate cardio post workout as for anything over 70% HR max, you’d be burning more glycogen than fat. I couldn’t find the exact issue because the search engine is broken and sorry if I’m off on the 70% but basically, the lower the HR%, the more fat you burn.
My question is what is the minimum % you need to acheive to burn fat? Would walking after lifting suffice? What about on non-lifting days?
Can you do your cardio before lifting? I was lead to believe that if you reduce your glycogen stores before lifting you would reach the “burn” faster during your work out. Should I do cardio after so that I can use glycogen stores for heavier weight?
Don’t worry so much about how much fat you’re burning rather worry about how many calories you’re burning from your activity. Please don’t be like one of those panzees who gets on the cardio equipment and after taking his pulse says “ooopss gotta slow, down i’m out of my fat burning zone” Yes you will burn a higher % of fat at a lower intensity exercise (actually more during sleep than anything else) but recent research shows that total calories are more important.
its the total calories that matter. just because your body doesn’t burn fat as its primary energy source at the time of exercise doesn’t mean you will not end up losing fat. by upping your intensity your body will also store carbs more efficiently and burn fat more efficiently after your workout, which is a much larger time period than during workout. its kind of like if you were to eat no fat and all carbs and protein. just because you aren’t taking in fat, doesn’t mean you won’t gain any fat. its the total calories that determine it.
that’s a good question and does indeed give some credence to the practice of eating less frequently or at least eating carbohydrate meals less frequently so the body is more able to burn fat. The way I understand it you are always going to be burning “some” fat but if you are constantly taking in high carbohydrate meals the amount of fat you will burn will be less which once again gives credence to the philosophy of “don’t worry about the % of fat you burn during your exercise just worry about the total amount of calories you burn.” Even if you are eating high carb meals all day long however you still should be burning a good amount of fat during the night whenever you sleep. Hope this helps
Because if you eat less calories than your body uses you have to lose weight via the law of thermodynamics. Say you put fuel in your car every 3 hours. What if you put in 3 oz every 3hours but drove 200 miles every 3 hours? Well you would run out of gas and the car would die. In the case of your body (the car) you don’t die instead your body gets the extra fuel from fat cells (stored fuel.)